Buying land that has a natural gas line on it?

[Oaktree]

Unless the gas well is on the property and you get the mineral rights there would be no free gas just because the line crosses your property and the owner when the line went in would have received so much per foot if that is how it was done in your area.

Curiously, is this compensation a one-time deal to whoever owned the property at the time or are there annual "rent" payments to current owners? I'd be reluctant to purchase a piece of property if it's the latter...allowing someone to use my land for commercial purposes with no benefit to me.

Edit: Torvy beat me to it on a couple of my comments, but does a landowner have the right to cancel a RoW agreement? I suppose that varies by state, and no doubt would not be easy to do.

 

[4570Man]

Curiously, is this compensation a one-time deal to whoever owned the property at the time or are there annual "rent" payments to current owners? I'd be reluctant to purchase a piece of property if it's the latter...allowing someone to use my land for commercial purposes with no benefit to me.

Edit: Torvy beat me to it on a couple of my comments, but does a landowner have the right to cancel a RoW agreement? I suppose that varies by state, and no doubt would not be easy to do.

They probably have a time limit like 100 years and at that point they would have to renegotiate but the land owner can’t just cancel the deal.

 

[Hughman]

San Bruno was my first thought when I started reading this thread.

 

[LHF2019]

I agree that the reputation of the pipe line company is very important. However, pipe line companies get bought/sold just like other companies. The pipe lines thru our property got bought out by another one, so you may end up with a different company than the one you started with. For us, it was beneficial in that the buyer seems to be more responsible and responsive.

The company that put in the gas wells/lines is long gone. I think we are on our third or fourth company now.

Curiously, is this compensation a one-time deal to whoever owned the property at the time or are there annual "rent" payments to current owners? I'd be reluctant to purchase a piece of property if it's the latter...allowing someone to use my land for commercial purposes with no benefit to me.

Edit: Torvy beat me to it on a couple of my comments, but does a landowner have the right to cancel a RoW agreement? I suppose that varies by state, and no doubt would not be easy to do.

One time deal on the pipeline. No idea on what was paid. You didn't have to have it put on your property if you didn't want it, they would gladly go around you. I don't have all the detail as I was teenage at the time and didn't care. Mom would have the original contract. I have only paid to have National Fuel to maintain a hookup in case we loose the free gas which does happen from time to time. Most of the information I have gotten have been from the well tenders over the years. Found out this year when the regulator quit that the meter hasn't worked for years. Well tender just keeps reporting the same numbers. Eventually they will make us get new meters.

 

[Jstpssng]

Curiously, is this compensation a one-time deal to whoever owned the property at the time or are there annual "rent" payments to current owners? I'd be reluctant to purchase a piece of property if it's the latter...allowing someone to use my land for commercial purposes with no benefit to me.

Edit: Torvy beat me to it on a couple of my comments, but does a landowner have the right to cancel a RoW agreement? I suppose that varies by state, and no doubt would not be easy to do.

It's just like selling any piece of land off your property. You get a check, and then deal with it. Not much different than having an electric transmission line crossing your property.

 

[etpm]

I better check my easements. See if they run out any time soon. If they do then maybe free power and free phone and internet for life. Or at least until they bump me off. Is there a tongue in cheek emoji?

 

[JamesHW]

No easements up in the country (other than a neighbors leach field that projects 15’ over our line) and having a 50’ ravine bisecting the property discourages North-South pipelines in our area of which there are none other than the NG line that runs along the road servicing the houses. We did have an annoying telecommunications cable and supporting wire put in in the 70’s that ran along the road 20’ in from the road over our front yard, 30’ from the front door of our 1850’s farmhouse. Always found it unsightly and we would have trees drop branches on it and they did a lousy job keeping it clear lately. I was so pleased when no less than 5 bucket trucks and a supervisor appeared on our security cameras and over a couple of days removed the unsightly cables and their poles this year.

30 years ago we rented a cottage on an estate of a sweet old lady in NOVA who occupied the main house and we acted as caretakers (mowing and caring for flower beds) for the 5 acre property and us paying $500 per month rent. When she sadly died we were offered first refusal for the entire property and were given some easement documents including a plat that showed our 1,000 sq ft “cottage” and indicted a enormous sewer pipe buried deep just in front of the cottage, apparently installed not long before we moved in. It was like looking in the water under your boat and seeing a whale. The property ended up getting sold to the county to be added to an adjacent park, but we would have brought it in a heartbeat if we could have swung it is we had had a spare $500,000 laying around. The county let us live there rent free for a year while we found and purchased our current home.

 

[Z71]

What you also have to consider is the terrain near the line in that any construction could impact, i.e cause weakening of the soil and cause the stress to the pipe line. I was a surveyor and we did some survey work (aerial mapping) for a road that paralleled a 100 ft pipe line easement and the pipeline company was concerned with any work that could cause the line to shift. Btw this line stretched across many states and into Canada and they flew the line daily (patrol) and within an hour of them spotting our survey crew, the county sherif was on the scene investigating and the pipeline rep soon after. They did move the road to alleviate concerns. Just mentioning possibe issues with the pipeline company(s).

 

[ponytug]

@ShowroomShine

What is the worst case? Something like @ericm979 referenced above. This happened locally when the utility failed to check the integrity of the pipeline, ignored prior warnings about steel quality and build quality;

San Bruno pipeline explosion - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

I would think long and hard about being within the blast radius.

All the best,

Peter

 

[Gee Ray]

@ShowroomShine

What is the worst case? Something like @ericm979 referenced above. This happened locally when the utility failed to check the integrity of the pipeline, ignored prior warnings about steel quality and build quality;

San Bruno pipeline explosion - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

I would think long and hard about being within the blast radius.

All the best,

Peter

You need to go back 12 years to find an event that killed 8 people.

And I expect you will get into a car or truck to drive somewhere most days as an average of more then 90 people get killed every day in accidents. So more then 400,000 people since the pipeline accident have died in auto wrecks.

I will take a chance of the pipeline being safe over the chance of an auto accident. And I drive for a living.